dragonbook

4 UNIT I HOW TO FIND WHAT YOU'RE NOT LOOKING FOR ADJUSTING TO COLLEGE Several years ago, I was asked to say something to incoming freshman about adjusting to college. In many ways, I was delighted. This is a subject I really know something about. I myself adjusted to college quite well...too well. I adjusted so well that I spent 12 1/2 years as a college student. And I've now been teaching at Northern—well, since well before most of you were born. You see, I really adjusted well to college: so well, that I'd find it hard to adjust to being anywhere else. And since I know that many students will enjoy college every bit as much as I did, it's a real privilege to be able to welcome them to what I hope will be some of the most wonderful, exciting, and profitable years of their lives. But there's a bit of a problem, too. For while professors love to give students advice and while we write article after article and book after book trying to prepare students for success, it’s not altogether clear that the advice we give is really worth giving. In many ways, we are like Polonius in Shakespeare's play Hamlet. Polonius had the benefit of years of experience and observation, and his experiences gave him the ability to give his son his son (and everyone else) lots of great-sounding advice. But, while his words sounded wise, they usually didn’t help very much, --and, sometimes, they made things far worse than they were to begin with. Now I am sure I can give plenty of great-sounding advice myself. But I'm not all sure that I can do that much better than Polonius. And in the end, my main piece of advice (as you will see) is to ignore my advice--and find a much surer way of adjusting, not only to college, but to life itself.